Nancy's Doctor Who Minifics
by Nancy Brown
Summary: A series of minifics and drabbles about Doctor Who. Added: 'Two for the Ferry'
1. I Am Not Looking For a Key ROSE

Title: Drabble: I Am Not Looking for a Key to Open Every Door (Just a Pillow on Your Floor Where We Can Sit)  
Fandom: Doctor Who  
Character: Rose  
Rating: G  
Spoilers: up through "Doomsday"  
Prompt: door key

In her childhood, she loved stories about secret doors. She devoured the Narnia books, reread "The Secret Garden" until the book fell apart, grew up expecting every hidden room or unusual doorway to lead her somewhere wonderful. Gradually, the secret doors gave way to other dreams, more practical ideas. Rose stopped looking for the gateway to fairyland, started applying for jobs.

So much has changed.

Now, every night in her not-father's mansion, she takes out the key to the most magical place she has ever seen. She used to think that would be the hard part of finding fairyland.


	2. Girl Anachronism JENNY (TDD)

Title: Girl Anachronism  
Fandom: Doctor Who  
Character: Jenny  
Rating: G  
Summary: Drabble. Jenny doesn't fit.  
Author's Note: written for the Awesome Ladies Ficathon for **ninkasa**'s prompt here. Is set in my head immediately prior to In My Unique Position.

Jenny's mind is filled with so much knowledge, some days she feels her head will burst. Before her death, she already knew the poetry of slick gun oil, the diamond-sharp click of muscle into place, the perfect calyx of a war. Now she hears the songs that stars sing to one another, feels Time swirling around her in a maelstrom.

Of course she is a stranger on every new world: gods always are. Her father's companions ground him, protect him from his own terrible power, but she is alone here on her mad adventure.

It's time to change that.


	3. Experience TISH

Title: Experience  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Fandom: Doctor Who  
Character: Tish  
Rating: G  
Summary: Drabble. Some lessons stick.  
A/N: Written for **halfamoon**. (I actually had a different fandom listed for today's entry, but I saw Tish again tonight and changed my mind.)

Some things Tish knows far too well.

Older men are nothing but trouble. That goes double for the ones who don't look their age.

There are worse jobs than being someone's assistant.

Going into business for yourself is difficult, but it's preferable to finding out the hard way that you're working for a psychopath. Again.

Drinking songs will reach their pinnacle of bawdiness somewhere around the twenty-seventh century.

Singing drinking songs from the twenty-seventh century at the top of your lungs is a perfect way of cheering yourself up at two AM.

Never stop believing, even when hope seems lost.


	4. Underestimation DONNA x SHAUN

Title: Underestimation  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Fandoms: Doctor Who  
Characters: Donna, Shaun  
Rating: G  
Spoilers: Up through "End of Time"  
Summary: Drabble. Donna dreams.  
A/N: Written for **halfamoon**.

Donna dreams of weird magical things. She blames Shaun for showing her too many "Lord of the Potter Trek" (or something) films, because it's all Spock and orcs jumbled around in her head at night. Shaun always patiently explains his favourites to her, but if her grandfather's there, he changes the channel and that ends that.

Bloody science fiction, anyway.

She won't talk about the rest of the dreams, where she's the one who saves the day, where her typing skills stop the villain in his tracks. That's just ridiculous, even to her own ears. Donna knows she's nothing special.


	5. The Hole MARTHA SARAH JANE

Characters: Sarah Jane, Martha  
A/N: From a prompt at the Awesome Women Ficathon: "Sarah jane Smith (must) and Martha jones, Donna Noble, Rose or Amy. (optional) This guy's walkin' down a street when he falls in a hole ... "

A/N2: Strictly speaking, this is not a drabble.

* * *

The tea is long cold.

"I still dream about him. Almost every night. Some days it feels like my life isn't real, it's just the bit I need to wake up from, and I'll open my eyes, and I'll be back on the TARDIS. And it's awful." Martha's eyes are focused on a distant point nowhere near this room, and she plays with the diamond on her finger like a prisoner plays with a manacle.

Sarah Jane holds her shiver. "The dreams will stop. You'll wake up one day, and your life will be your life. You'll be glad you left the TARDIS, glad you went on to find out who you really are. You'll always love him." Martha's head shoots up, a protest on her lips, but Sarah Jane waits for it to still unspoken. "Everyone does. But one day, you'll think of it in the same wistful way you loved that one handsome but oblivious boy back in school."

She flinches. "And the memories?" _"Martha Jones, who walked the Earth. Be gentle with her,"_ said the message that appeared in K-9's memory banks one strange day. Sarah Jane supposes it's more polite than: _"Fix this mess I've made because I can't be bothered."_

"The bad ones will fade. The good ones will get rosier with time. Someday you can tell them to your grandchildren." Her pause stretches a little too long, and she wonders if Martha hears the tick of the clock in the quiet house. But Luke has gone out with his friends, like a normal boy, and while that doesn't mean she'll ever have grandchildren on her knee, it means something. "It will get better."

"Thanks," Martha says, her smile easier than it has been in hours. They chat a bit more, happier gossip of mutual acquaintances, and then Martha has to go with a hug and a promise of another visit soon.

As her car pulls away, Sarah Jane watches, and remembers last night's dream (giant robot, a nightmare made real) and wonders how long it will be until she herself wakes up and knows she is home for good.


	6. Legends RIVER x JACK

Title: Legends  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Rating: R  
Characters/Pairing: River/Jack (implied River/Doctor, Jack/others)  
Spoilers/Warnings: mild angst  
Words: 500  
Summary: He's a legend, if you know the right myths.  
AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s One Night to Write Prompt by **bendingwind**: Jack/River, substitutes for what (who) they really want.

* * *

The thing is, he's a legend, if you know the right myths. River's heard plenty of stories, even a few that haven't been written yet. He changes names, but his face only changes slowly. She caresses his cheek now, pressing a hand against his smooth jaw, feeling his purr as he kisses her. Her fingers drift back to the few grey hairs silvering his temples, and wonders what he must have been like back when his hair was still all dark.

She's an old hand at kisses and kissing, and these are definitely in her top five. No matter that she's drifting, just a little. It's been too soon since she last ran into her love. (Are they married at this point in his timeline? Ought she think of him as her husband? This is the part she hates about time travel.) For every stroke of this man's skilled hands down her arms, she feels the ghostly fingers of someone else, distracting her from what should be a delightful experience.

River smiles around a kiss and then twists her body. An easy grin greets her in return as she settles atop him. She's skilled at many things, though, like reading faces. He's enjoying himself, but there's a shadow locked behind his eyes, someone in his own head he's trying not to think about as he's here with her.

Almost visibly, he pushes away the memory, too wary himself to show his thoughts for long, and then the heat in his eyes is for River alone. The bite he presses into her flesh, the matching one she leaves on his lip, these speak of focus on the now. The legends were clear on this as well: if she were a little more naïve, she could let him make her feel like the only person in the world he wants at this moment. No wonder he's so famous.

And then it is just rhythm, and the slide of bodies together in the cold light of the cabin's one bulb, and yes, he's exactly as good at this as the stories claim. She'll have her own tale to add after tonight. It'll certainly make interesting reading the next time she runs into the Doctor.

She is not thinking about the Doctor. She is not.

When his eyes flutter closed from his pleasure, she doesn't know what name he's biting back, which old heartbreak he's failing to forget. When her own shut tight, she stops caring.

It's good. It's almost good enough.

The stories say he doesn't sleep, which is a damned lie. River gathers her things and leaves him dozing, pausing for a kiss at the edge of the silver. They'll meet again, she knows, but when his heart is bound up to another's. Some spoilers are useful to know when one has a habit of following myths.

This myth is just a man, however much life he has yet to spend, and she has legends of her own to be making.


	7. Partners RIVER JENNY

Title: Partners  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Rating: PG  
Characters/Pairing: River, Jenny  
Spoilers/Warnings: none  
Words: 330  
Summary: Almost a lost opportunity.  
AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s One Night to Write, Prompt by **sleepscribbling**: River + Jenny, looking for their man

* * *

River is very nearly stupid, just once. She sees the girl, all wide eyes and ponytail and eager smile, and she almost dismisses her, almost turns away to join the throng in the marketplace. She wouldn't have noticed her at all, but fellow human-shaped beings are uncommon here. Later, River will have the occasional nightmare that seems so benign: she walks off and never finds her way back.

Then the girl says something about transmorphic propulsion, and like a beacon, she's the most interesting thing River has seen in weeks. It's not hard to sidle over to the booth and wait for a break in the haggling.

She's not wanted under her real name in this system yet. "River Song," she says, extending her hand. "And you are?"

"Call me Jenny." Her smile is bright and perky and new, but the name trips a memory, a mention River once saw in the TARDIS's memory banks when she was digging for something else.

They form a fast friendship, aligning themselves against the merchant who is trying to cheat Jenny out of too much money for the parts she needs. By the end, they've cheated him instead and there went River's good reputation in this area of space. She decides she's spent her name well this time, especially when, dashing away from the merchant's unsmiling heavies, she manages to push Jenny to the ground out of the way of a laser blast. Not only does she get a quick thrill - blonde and pretty, River prefers redheads but she's open-minded - she can feel the double-beat of Gallifreyan hearts. The expression on Jenny's face as they acknowledge the shared truth between them is an unneeded confirmation, but welcome.

There is no word in the language they are speaking for "the person who will someday be your step-daughter." River settles for a helping hand up, as they finally reach the safety of Jenny's tinkered-together vessel.

"Are you coming with me, then?" Jenny asks, eyes bright with a mischief River knows all too well.

As if she'd ever say no. They are, after all, in search of the same person.

"Let's go."


	8. Work Release Program RIVER

Title: Work-Release Program  
Character: River  
Rating: G  
Summary: Drabble. There's a tradition at Stormcage.

* * *

It's no coincidence that the youngest, most fresh-faced soldier-clerics are given custody of the notorious Dr. Song as their first assignment in Stormcage. New recruits are handed the training hologram, lists of prisoners and their crimes, and strict instructions on handling River Song. Every single one reacts to this last with a smirk. _He_ won't be caught out so easily.

Every single one is found with lipstick on his cheek and an empty cell.

The bishop-warden observes each escape with amusement. River will return when she's ready, and the new clerics will acquire some wisdom. Everybody wins.


	9. Swordpoint VASTRA x JENNY

_**Spoilers: DW, "A Good Man Goes to War"**_

Title: Swordpoint  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Rating: PG  
Characters: Vastra/Jenny  
Summary: It starts with knives.

* * *

Jenny's knives can protect her from any man who tries to take her few possessions or her virtue. Time are hard, her family is gone, and she must find work. She'll gladly go into service if only she can secure a position.

She's followed one night, her footsteps dogged until she's trapped. Her knives will fend off one man, not five at once. Her sudden saviour in the alley hides her face but not her sword, and dispatches the other four.

The hood slips, showing emerald green.

Jenny doesn't run. "Can you teach me how to do that?"

Vastra smiles.


	10. Service VASTRA x JENNY

_**Spoilers: DW, "A Good Man Goes to War"**_

Title: Service  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Rating: PG  
Characters: Vastra/Jenny  
Summary: There's no shame in being a servant.

* * *

There's no shame in service, her mother taught her. Jenny has heard the chilling tales: cruel and vain mistresses, masters demanding their servants' bodies. She has great pity for the girls who find themselves in such households. It could have been her.

She readies Madame Vastra's bath, to wash her mistress clean of tonight's bloody work. She knows many would recoil from the rusting crimson on green scales, would pity _her_. They understand nothing.

Jenny helps scrub the difficult places on Vastra's back, then settles in to join her in the water, embracing her tired lady.

Service has its joys.


	11. Misapprehension VASTRA x JENNY

Title: Misapprehension  
Fandom: Doctor Who  
Characters/Pairing: Jenny/Vastra  
Rating: R  
Summary: Jenny is happy to be wrong.  
Prompts: swords, tongue, green, scales, taste

* * *

Jenny thought swords were used for men to surround and bully and take, thought Vastra would leverage her power at the tip of a blade.

Jenny thought the scales would be slimy, would cause shivers of revulsion to consume her the first time Vastra drew her hand down the soft skin of Jenny's back.

Jenny thought "green" was the colour meat turned when it rotted and she had to choke it down anyway if she intended to survive, thought Vastra would taste of defilement and spoilage.

Jenny thought her best prospect would be as some man's possession, subject to his whims even as she closed her eyes against his gross needs.

The swords buy them peace, and freedom, and protection. Jenny's arms and legs ache each night after her daily work and her hours of training. She is no longer afraid of the steel, though there's a resigned sigh when she knows it will be time to practise thrusts and parries.

The scales are dry and smooth, sliding under Jenny's hand like rough silk. Vastra writhes when Jenny massages her belly, and her scaly hands are as tender as a baby's, holding Jenny's face.

The green skin under Jenny's kisses tastes of smoke from the oil lamps, tastes of leather from Madame's breeches, undulates like the green sea Jenny spied once from a distance. The flavour of the sweat between Vastra's breasts is sealike, salty, and the moist, hidden place between Vastra's thighs reminds her of green apples, tartsweet and juicy on her lips. Jenny drinks her like cider, worships her like the ocean. Her turn will come to lie spread while Vastra's long tongue undoes her slowly. She belongs to her mistress, heart and soul, and is joyful in the surrender.

Jenny doesn't mind being wrong, not when this feels so right.


	12. Timing RIVER x NINE

Title: Timing  
Characters/Pairing: 9th Doctor/River  
Rating: Adults only  
Prompts: first time, last time, glasses, curl, against the wall

* * *

It isn't every student who can bend Luna University's stringent rules about time travel in order to finish a paper. Truth be told, River isn't technically on the list of students with permission. However, a strategic kiss here, and a misdirection there, and why look, that bit of tech on loan from the Time Agency just happens to land in her hand.

She always has been curious about the start of the rebellion on the third moon of Galliod. Sources say the miners had enough of the poor wages and terrible working conditions, but sources fail to explain why the same conditions over the past three thousand years hadn't led to a faster revolution. River has her own thesis, and she's ready to take notes.

She meets him in a shady eating-house in the worst part of the shantytown where the miners live. They're the only two people in the place who look completely human; it's her private joke that she knows she's not. He's severely handsome with his close-cropped hair and sharp features, not pretty like most of her lovers, something more dangerous. She's not her normally gorgeous self, either, with her curls carefully flattened and mischievous eyes hidden by thick glasses that help her peer through the weird gaseous layers of the moon's atmosphere. But he can't stop staring at her.

"I've heard about Time Agents," he warns her the first time they're alone, pointing to the borrowed computer on her wrist.

She's reckless tonight. "It's all true. We're exactly as bad as you think." Impersonating a Time Agent carries a prison sentence, but only if she gets caught.

She fucks him for the first time up against the wall of the rented room. Odd: he looks and sounds like a veteran of too many wars, but he makes love like a virgin. He lets her lead, and River is only too happy. She perfected her skills long ago, wearing another body and using poor stupid Jeff as a dildo when none of the other boys or girls would play. She works her new friend like an orgasm-dispensing machine, all tight control waiting for her to suck and stroke the right lever.

"Why are you here?" he asks her, as they lay exhausted on what's probably a bug-infested mattress. He told her mid-fuck that his name is John. Equally invested in anonymity, she told him hers is Jane.

He's a time traveller like she is, that much is clear. "I've come to observe the start of the miners' revolt. You?"

"I'm here to prevent it."

It turns out they're both incorrect. River shows the wrong amount of leg at the wrong time, and follows by showing the wrong amount of boob. John helps rescue a miner's child from a sink hole, and tells her mother that she deserves to grow up in a better world. Three days later, the revolt is in full swing, but, River notes with some amusement, it's not nearly as bloody as her books said.

"I have to go," John says, but he stays one more night, nuzzling her open as she's taught him, cold hands and cold mouth turning her belly to fire with every lick. He's in pain she can't touch, and every moment with her buries it for a while. She herself is on a great journey, and can spare him the surcease as she digs through stone histories for evidence of the good man she wants to believe her mother knows. The records says the Doctor came here. River laughs a little inside her head, coming apart under this stranger's mouth and fingers and cool cock for the last heady time. He'll be gone before she wakes. River needs to leave soon as well, and regrets not finding what she came for.

She wonders if she's too late to find him, but only when John leaves does she wonder if she's too early after all.


	13. Janus VASTRA X JENNY

Title: Janus  
Characters/Pairings: Jenny Flint/Madame Vastra, Jenny Flint/OFC  
Warnings: non-explicit mentions of sexual exploitation of women and children  
Beta: I'd like to thank **bookwormsarah** for her particular expertise. :D  
Summary: Sometimes her name was Jenny, sometimes James.  
AN: Written for **halfamoon** and for Trope Bingo square: crossdressing  
AN2: Has been slightly jossed by "The Name of the Doctor"

* * *

James Flint existed in the church records, if you didn't look too closely, and no-one ever did. Baby James had died a week after his and Jenny's mum did, four months after his birth. The less said about Jenny's dad, the better, and the kindest thing he did for her was vanish from her life. The orphanage was not as terrible as some, lending their children out to sell their work rather than their bodies. Still, Jenny had her fill of nearly-empty bellies each night, and as soon as she was twelve, she stole a change of clothes from the boys' dormitory and disappeared into the night.

Jenny shed her plain frock, cropped her hair, and called herself by her brother's name. The jobs offered to James meant backbreaking work but no stares or worse from men she passed by on the street. By fifteen, she made enough in intermittent wages, supplemented by the occasional picking of a plump pocket, to keep her belly full. She found a safe place to sleep, mates who didn't ask questions, and enough sense to keep her head down.

At sixteen, she lost all three.

Regina had chestnut curls, and prettier dresses than Jenny had ever worn. Regina liked the rough but well-meant manners James showed every time they met outside her father's shop. Regina smelled of rose water, and when she and James stole kisses behind the old shed, she tasted like lemons. The affair lasted two glorious months, before a love-struck and sleep-deprived James made a tactical error changing clothes back at the flophouse. Jenny got out alive and unmolested, thanks to a well-positioned knee, but she had to flee. She went to Regina's home late that same night and asked her to run away. They could go into the country, or sail over the sea together.

"Please," said Jenny, and she was Jenny when she asked. And Regina kissed her and said, "No."

By seventeen, Jenny Flint had taken work in the scullery of a nice home on the other side of the city, far away from the adventures of her last life. She cleaned and scrubbed until her hands were raw every night, earning half the wages she'd made unloading crates at the docks. The mistress of the house was kind. The master patted her bottom regularly but otherwise left her alone. She wasn't yet eighteen by the time she'd had enough of a maid's life, in both senses, slapped the master when he was mid-pat, then stormed out before he could call for the constables.

James Flint, now dressed in good workman's clothes, joined the crews digging tunnels for the underground trains everyone was talking about. James gave the age of sixteen to explain his youthful voice and bare chin, and he didn't socialise with the other blokes. Some had wives, and some had sweethearts, and not a one could suss out if James had either. He ate his meals keeping to himself, and walked alone to the boardinghouse where he paid extra to have his own room. Yet, when one of the men, Claude, started looming over a harried-looking girl of no more than fifteen, James got up from his lunch, and he punched the man so hard he broke a tooth.

"Sorry," James said, but it was to the girl, who nodded and kept hurrying away.

Claude caught up with James the next day. Jenny could fight, as long as she was quick, but Claude was bigger. He gave her a thrashing, though she made sure it cost him. Aching, bruised, she almost didn't go into work again, and some nights, some horrible nights when she can't sleep even with the restful sound of Vastra's breaths beside her, Jenny dreams she didn't. In her dreams, Vastra woke up alone, with Claude hovering in shock over her suddenly-stirring form, her gorgeous green body on display and her head still too sick with hibernation to defend herself.

On the terrible nights, Jenny has nightmares of what could have happened, had she not gone digging that day despite her injuries and James's wounded pride, too tired for a rematch but damned if she wasn't going to bite off Claude's ear for where he put his foul hand. She'd no idea the beautiful emerald lady would help as soon as she got her bearings. True, the beautiful woman would go on a bit of a rampage, and Jenny wouldn't meet up with her again for months, but these were small problems, inconsequential, for when they re-encountered one another, Jenny pledged to herself that they would never again be separated.

At nineteen, Jenny met the love of her life, while wearing men's garb and her dead brother's name. She wouldn't have it any other way.

* * *

The End


	14. Ghost Girl CLARA

Title: Ghost Girl  
Characters: Clara, Eleven (unrequited Clara/Eleven)  
Rating: PG  
Warnings: character death  
Spoilers: up through TNotD  
Words: 450  
Summary: She isn't a ghost. This isn't a ghost story.  
AN: Written as a treat for **astrogirl2** in Eleventy Fest.

* * *

"This isn't a ghost story, it's a love story."

Clara is not a ghost. Once, when she was four years old, she spent a week running about with a bedsheet over her head shouting "Woo!" to her mum, but Mum just said she wasn't allowed to watch any more Scooby-Doo cartoons. Dad said real ghosts didn't wear Little Mermaid bedsheets on their heads. Clara gave up on being a ghost.

She watches him at the TARDIS controls. Underneath the mania, she sees a thin crackle of terror peeping through every mad word, every rubbery expression. The Doctor isn't her boyfriend. She's not sure he's her friend. Today he is looking past her, through her. She's tempted to shout, "Woo!" simply to attract his attention back to the person in front of him.

She isn't a ghost. This isn't a ghost story. She doesn't know if his words imply she's in the other story.

Love. Heart-fluttering and terrifying. She thinks he does like her. She's sure he finds her attractive. Rather than dwell on the possibility of romance, Clara focuses on the elegance of his hands massaging the switches. The TARDIS is his true love; that's as plain to see as his chin.

* * *

Angie knocks on the door but doesn't wait for an invitation. "You in?"

"Obviously." Clara has a book open. She can't remember what she was reading.

"Is your boyfriend coming today?"

No amount of protests will budge Angie from her belief that Clara pops off every Wednesday to snog the Doctor senseless. "It's Saturday."

"Why doesn't he ever ask you out on weekends?"

"I'm busy. Wednesday's my day off."

"I bet he's married, really." She turns on one trainer and leaves the room before Clara can argue. It's her newest technique, picked up at school. Clara remembers being this age. It'll pass.

* * *

She flies apart. She's a ghost. She's less than a ghost. Clara Oswin Oswald stops existing. Claras and Oswins and Oswalds exist everywhere, everywhen. Splinters overlap, spending their lives ignorant of one another.

On Skaro, Ossie is a Thal who dies in the last great battle.

In Florence, Chiara the servant fights off Captain Tancredi, and dies with her discovery that Scaroth is the only being throughout history who might have understood her.

She dies. She dies. She leaves behind her ghost after ghost, echo after echo. Clara is all ghosts.

She can choose to stop. She chooses not to stop. She loves him. She loves him like a friend, like a hero. She loves him as a man who looks through her to love another.

But he's wrong. This isn't a love story. It's always been a ghost story.

omewhere inside the splintered shards of herself, Clara shouts out, "Woo!"


	15. Two for the Ferry JACK ELEVEN

Title: Two for the Ferry  
Characters: Jack, Eleven  
Spoilers: up through Day of the Doctor  
AN: How the thing ended up at the place.

* * *

"I need a favour."

Jack didn't look up from the paper in his hands. "You always need a favour." His heart gave a thump, small, thinking on how much had changed, how he had changed. Once, he'd have already knocked over the table springing to action for the Doctor's sake. Now, he made himself wait another three seconds before he even met the Doctor's eyes. "What is it?"

"I need to borrow your Vortex Manipulator."

Jack's eyebrows raised. "Is that all?"

"Yes." This face was young, odd, rubbery. Jack had seen photographs of this Doctor. They'd never met.

"Need to dangle it over my head again? Maybe use it for a quick hop around the galaxy before you break it in front of me one more time?"

"Not exactly. I'm dealing with a potential paradox. It's easiest if you play along." He sat down in the other chair. The breezy summer air made his hair stick up. Across from the café, three kids hunched over a hand-held video game of some sort, chatting and laughing. Jack was relearning to spend time around children, retraining himself not to flinch. Time healed all wounds. He had the wounds, and he had the time.

"What sort of paradox?"

The young-faced, rubbery-faced, all-wrong Doctor shrugged. "Fate of the world. Usual stuff. Oh, and you'll want to keep an eye out for Zygons."

Jack let out a muttering sigh and set the paper aside. It wasn't as if he'd been reading. "Them again?"

"UNIT will be working out a treaty. Not to worry. They're in good hands." His eyes dropped to Jack's left wrist. "But speaking of hands…."

Jack lay his right hand over his wrist strap. "I don't want to lose it forever."

"You won't. My friend Clara will drop it off when we're finished. You'll like her, and no, _don't_ under any circumstances." His face curled into a suspicious glare.

Jack considered his options, but his life had been a series of running low on options. His gaze travelled to the kids across the street. One had stowed the game in a carrier, and they walked off together, still chattering.

Wordlessly, he unbuckled the strap, and placed it on the table.

"Thank you," said the Doctor, lifting the VM and placing it into a deep pocket of his coat. When his hand returned, Jack's eyes were caught by a glimmer. A shining, vaguely blue coin lay on the table.

He reached over, hesitating with a questioning look. The Doctor nodded. Jack picked up the coin. Coins. There were two. "Is this what I think it is?"

"A token. A day. Twenty-four hours to spend, anywhere, anywhen. Consider it a thank you for the loan."

Jack spread the pair of coins out. "There's two."

"I owed you interest for past thanks."

Two days. Two trips. Anywhere. To see anyone.

The children had walked down the street and were out of sight.

"Doctor…."

The Doctor stood. "Call me when you're ready to go. You have the number."

Jack threw down a few coins, normal ones rather than his precious new gift, for his abandoned meal. "As a matter of fact, I'm free now."

The Doctor smiled. "I thought you might be. Let's go."


End file.
